A Common Enemy

"....because they all happened close to Soviet railheads and far from Chinese railheads. And so we concluded that probably the Soviets were the aggressors. Once that was established in our mind we concluded that in a conflict between two communist giants the rules of equilibrium... [which] required that we back the weaker against the stronger. It's no great insight for Britishers but in America that is not the way foreign policy is usually perceived. And then we started from then on we started moving actively and took measures to find means of contact with the Chinese." - Kissinger

Boarder disputes and the severing of diplomatic relations between China and Russia began with China's first nuclear bomb test. At first, the US sided with Russia. As tensions continued, a pattern began to emerge: all clashes were located near Soviet railroads. They were recorded as Chinese attacks yet Soviets committed the aggression. The US could not let Russia bully China. However, the two countries had different plans. China wanted protection against Soviet power. Nixon, wanted diplomatic relations with the Soviets however, they were not interested. Instead Nixon pushed for a stronger alliance with China. With this China-Soviet drift, the US now had advantage. Nixon set the communist powers against each other forcing them to accept US terms.

Margaret MacMillan

Soviet-China Conflict

US Position

"In the United States Richard Nixon came into office, elected in 1968 and, I think, he had already, I mean, the evidence is that he hadalready begun to reach the conclusion that the United States should try an opening toChina and he had been talking about this before he became President both to his innercircle and also had said something about this in an article that he wrote for foreign affairs in 1967 and I think, he decided that this was necessary for the United States and he had, Ithink, very good reason for making this decision.To begin with he felt that an opening to China would put pressure on the Soviet Union.The split between China and the Soviet Union was now clear to everyone. I mean,initially when the Chinese and Soviets began hurling insults at each other it was in veryarcane communist language. You know, they called each other revisionists and backsliders and some people didn't really pick up the fact that this was extremely rudeterminology in the communist world and there were even conspiracy theories inWashington and elsewhere who said this is a very clever plot on the part of the communist, convinces of their falling out but they haven't really fallen out.But I think even the most obdurate were now convinced by the end of the 1960s andNixon felt that using the split and establishing a relationship with China would putpressure on the Soviet Union and it was necessary. The Soviets were, of course,thoroughly enjoying the spectacle of United States coming to grief in Vietnam and wereproving to be rather slow to want to have a summit, to want to negotiate the arms dealsand other parts of (unclear) that Nixon felt were necessary. And so Nixon felt that anopening to China would benefit the United States."

Well early on we started out believing the conventional wisdom, namely that the Chinese were rabid ideologues and extremely aggressive. Then one day Dubrinin came in and briefed me about a clash they had had I think near the Yusuri river, and spoke about the possibility jointly of getting this under control or getting the danger under control. And this was so uncharacteristic of the Soviets that they would brief us about disagreements they had with third parties, that he actually vastly overplayed his hand. And if I recall my correction correctly I sort of was opaque in my response in order to start him to worry. But I still believed it likely that the Chinese had been the ones who started it. And so he came in two or three more times with reports of other clashes. And we plotted those on a map and a few months later when I was in San Clemente I asked somebody from the Rand Corporation - I think his name was Alan Whiting, to come down and talk to me in general terms about China. And he said that in his view it was the Soviets who were the aggressors and not the Chinese. And then when we looked at how we had plotted it on the map a light went out up in our mind, which - because they all happened close to Soviet railheads and far from Chinese railheads. And so we concluded that probably the Soviets were the aggressors. Once that was established in our mind we concluded that in a conflict between two communist giants the rules of equilibrium which Americans usually don't recognize, but the rules of equilibrium required that we back the weaker against the stronger. It's no great insight for Britishers but in America that is not the way foreign policy is usually perceived. And then we started from then on we started moving actively and took measures to find means of contact with the Chinese.

Chinese Position

"And Mao Tse-tung,although he was old and increasingly ailing still decided all the important strategyquestions and indeed some of the less important issues as well.And Mao was beginning to reach the conclusion by 1969 that China was, in fact, in arather dangerous situation. Now a lot of that was his doing. He had managed to alienatemost of his neighbors. He had fought a war with India. China was on very bad terms withSouth Korea. It was on no terms at all with Taiwan, in fact, it was always on the edge of awar with Taiwan. It was on no terms with Japan. It had very few friends. Indeed, its mainfriend, - he had also during the cultural revolution which had turned China upside downclosed most of China's embassies abroad and brought China's diplomats back so theirthoughts and attitudes could be purified of whatever dangerous foreign ideas they hadpicked up when they were awayAnd so some of China's most experienced and distinguished diplomats were out in thecountry working on farms in order to learn from the farmers and so really the main friendthat China had in the world by 1969 was Albania and Albania was a very ferventsupporter. Now you shouldn't laugh like that because Albania will be very hurt but Albania was not a major world power and although Albania was steadfast and fervent inits support for China it really did not make up for all the other enemies China had,particularly, of course, China was worried about the Soviet Union.The Soviet Union had been moving troops out to the common border in the Far Eastincreasingly, several million of them. It was also stationing bombers in places like OuterMongolia which was a Soviet satellite which were capable of carrying nuclear warheadsand in the spring and summer of 1969 there were armed clashes along the common borderin which the Chinese and Soviet soldiers were killed.Very alarmingly for the Chinese in the fall of 1969 they began to get reports that Sovietdiplomats were going around and asking rather curious questions at cocktail parties.Soviet diplomats would sidle up apparently to American diplomats and say, you know,after the usual chit-chat, 'I have a hypothetical question for you, purely hypothetical, Ishould stress. What would your government say', meaning the American government, 'Say and this is purely hypothetical, if the Soviet Union were to drop, in a purelyhypothetical way, a few nuclear bombs on China' and the American government or theAmerican officials would say, quiet rightly, "Our government would look on that and itsvery dangerous indeed and then likely to lead to a Third World War and so, we wouldrather you didn't think of doing it."And word of this got back to the Chinese. I mean, they began to hear these rumors andthere was a real panic in Beijing in the fall of 1969. A number of the top leaders went outof town and huge civil defense preparations were made because they really were afraid ofa sneak Soviet nuclear attack. Now Mao talked a lot of bravado, don't worry, he said Iwill go up to the hills again and fight just like I did. Well Mao would have to have beencarried up to the hills and probably would not have survived. I mean his health was verybad indeed and I think even Mao living in his rather imperial isolation in Beijing wasbeginning to realize that China was in a very dangerous situation indeed and that therevolution and all that he had worked for was at risk of being lost. And so by the end of 1969 the key leaders and I think this really a case where you have to look at the key leaders in both the United States and the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China had decided the time had come to talk to each other."

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